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Old 03-11-2004, 12:42 PM   #1
SpiritWarrior
Jack Burton
 

Join Date: May 31, 2002
Location: Ireland
Posts: 5,854
If anyone could assist me with some techy help here I'd appreciate it. I know it is possible to connect two computers together and I know it involves network cards but how exactly is it done? I'm looking to connect a system I just bought from a friend to my own so both can connect to the same ISP and share the bandwidth. Right now I'm on 56k since my braodband went down 2 months ago so I want both computers to run from the same dial-up connection. They would, in essence share the bandwidth I imagine but I wonder would this make it pointless since It's dial-up already (both computers would essentially have only half a standard dial-up bandwidth to work with).

My questions are: Would both systems have to be running the same OS? Would it be easier to have them both on the same OS i.e. XP home (I wanted to run the older one on win 98 for resource reasons and keep my newer one on XP)? I need 2 network cards and some form of cable right? How is it all setup exactly?
Even a good website explaining it all would be a great help, thanks!

[ 03-11-2004, 12:44 PM: Message edited by: SpiritWarrior ]
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Old 03-11-2004, 01:19 PM   #2
philip
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Join Date: June 24, 2002
Location: aa
Posts: 2,101
If you only want to share your internet you need a router and one network card. You can direct connect one computer (the one you already had) directly to the router and the other via the network card and either cable or wireless antenna. For wireless cards I'd be careful as they seem to need room around the computer or at least mine does. So I can't put it directly to the wall on one side and to my desk at the other cause the connection will be significantly less. Though it works great and easy if you can move your computer around a bit.

BTW if you put in the network card and you get a lot of random reboots your IRQ is incorrect due to stupid windows plug&play and it's easy to fix. It might not happen but if it happens you already know.

If you buy something make sure you get it at a good shop they'll be able to tell you exactly how it works and can give you more suggestions, especially on what you need or shoudl consider
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Old 03-11-2004, 01:44 PM   #3
SpiritWarrior
Jack Burton
 

Join Date: May 31, 2002
Location: Ireland
Posts: 5,854
Thanks for the help. Yes, all I want to do is share my internet connection, nothing more. Excuse my ignorance here but I have never done this and have no idea what I already have [img]smile.gif[/img] .

Okay so what kind of router would I need to get or is there a standard model and how much do they sell for usually? A recommendation would be great. A router is an external box thing right? So there's no way I already have one internally?

I think I already have a network card in my dell, how would I check that and again, what kind is a good kind?
Did you mean the direct connect facility on windows xp? I thought the other computer had to be running XP to use that, or did you just mean a manual connection.

Again, I'm lost when it comes to networking etc. but if someone can tell me exactly what to get I can go on down to radioshack and pick it up once I know what to do.
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Old 03-11-2004, 01:55 PM   #4
harleyquinn
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Join Date: November 25, 2002
Location: NY
Age: 48
Posts: 1,190
Quote:
Originally posted by philip:
BTW if you put in the network card and you get a lot of random reboots your IRQ is incorrect due to stupid windows plug&play and it's easy to fix. It might not happen but if it happens you already know.
I was having this issue. How do you fix the IRQ?
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Old 03-11-2004, 02:20 PM   #5
SpiritWarrior
Jack Burton
 

Join Date: May 31, 2002
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Quote:
Originally posted by harleyquinn:
quote:
Originally posted by philip:
BTW if you put in the network card and you get a lot of random reboots your IRQ is incorrect due to stupid windows plug&play and it's easy to fix. It might not happen but if it happens you already know.
I was having this issue. How do you fix the IRQ? [/QUOTE]I'd imagine in the Bios.
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Old 03-11-2004, 02:29 PM   #6
Timber Loftis
40th Level Warrior
 

Join Date: July 11, 2002
Location: Chicago, IL
Posts: 11,916
I picked up a cable that directly connects on computer to another via ethernet cards. However, this cable only works with plug-and-play ease if both computers are running XP. For my ME computer (thankfully, passed on now), fiddling with the ME computer to get it to see the network was more trouble than it was worth.

I don't know if this kind of connection could be used to share internet, but I think it could. I know that I've been in an office with my laptop and plugged it into the network router (an older system which would not recognize my computer) and was immediately able to access the internet.

Besides, this method ties up both ethernet ports on the computers, so it may not work for you if your internet connection is through the ethernet port anyway.
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Old 03-11-2004, 02:44 PM   #7
Animal
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Join Date: March 29, 2002
Location: Canada
Age: 51
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If you're sharing a dial-up a router won't really help you out much, since they are designed for broadband/ethernet.

What you need is a network card in both machines, and ICS (Internet Connection Sharing) to be active on your XP box. Don't worry about the difference in OS's, your XP install disk can be used to set up ICS on your 98 box.

You will need to connect both network cards together with cable, and then run the home networking wizard on your XP machine. It's quite simple and inexpensive to do.

Having said that however, you'll find that trying to use both machines on the internet at the same time will be quite painful with a dial-up connection, and will probably cause you more frustration that anything else. Using them seperately, ie. only one machine on the net at a time will be fine.
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Old 03-11-2004, 03:43 PM   #8
philip
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Join Date: June 24, 2002
Location: aa
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Quote:
Originally posted by harleyquinn:
quote:
Originally posted by philip:
BTW if you put in the network card and you get a lot of random reboots your IRQ is incorrect due to stupid windows plug&play and it's easy to fix. It might not happen but if it happens you already know.
I was having this issue. How do you fix the IRQ? [/QUOTE]So if you reboot somewhere in the POST there's a table with IRQ numbers in it. You have to check which components are on the same slot. The ones that are causing the reboot are frequently used cards, for me it were the network controller (=network card) and display controller (=video card). There are 2 options here. One will only work if the two cards aren't clustered by M$ stupid plug&play. Go into BIOS and find the PCI menu. There you can set the IRQ numbers from automatically to a chosen number. There seem to be a few tricky slots and/or combinations of slot and cards and it probably won't work so it's not my favourite way. The other way is check which cards cause the reboot (both used a lot at the same time) open your computer and move one of the cards till you've found a slot which isn't clustered with another frequently interrupting card. For this you have to reboot everytime after you've changed a slot till you've found the correct one. edit: safer way as well cause it doesn't involve changing BIOS.

Hope it's clear and helps!

[ 03-11-2004, 03:44 PM: Message edited by: philip ]
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Old 03-11-2004, 03:49 PM   #9
harleyquinn
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Join Date: November 25, 2002
Location: NY
Age: 48
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In that case I don't think IRQ is the cause of my problem.
My router is what keeps rebooting, not my computers. Everytime it reboots, the IPCONFIG information gets changed from the router's info to what you'd get if you were connected directly to the cable modem, hence no multiple IP'S when that happens, so then both my computers (laptop and desktop) can't connect.
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Old 03-11-2004, 04:04 PM   #10
Animal
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Join Date: March 29, 2002
Location: Canada
Age: 51
Posts: 2,534
Quote:
Originally posted by harleyquinn:
In that case I don't think IRQ is the cause of my problem.
My router is what keeps rebooting, not my computers. Everytime it reboots, the IPCONFIG information gets changed from the router's info to what you'd get if you were connected directly to the cable modem, hence no multiple IP'S when that happens, so then both my computers (laptop and desktop) can't connect.
ADSL or Cable?

Does it reboot while your computers are accessing the net? Off the top of my head I'd say your IP address from your service providing is changing especially if you are not using an "always on" connection such as cable. Some providers don't like it when you try to use 1 connection for multiple PC's?

Every time the router reboots check the WAN IP address of your router to see if it is in fact changing each time. If so, you'll need to configure your router to use a non-static IP.
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